I had a good shopping day yesterday. I went out to buy coffee and wound up with a new dress, two new undergarments, hair conditioner, and a bath mat. I remembered to get the coffee just before I left the mall, thank goodness. I didn't mean to buy another dress but I was mooching around the lingerie department and found a sales rack of -- well, I don't quite know what to call them. Dresses to stay home in, maybe. This one is moss green and cream, very loose and crinkly and informal. So I bought it, and then I found something I've wanted ever since I moved here: granny pants! They look as if you took a slip and sewed the center together to make loose leggings. Marvelous invention, and just the ticket for the hot, steamy summer when my inner thighs chafe and a mere slip won't do.

Home with the goods and on with the tv to see whether the powers that be had decided to bring home the Mir Space Station inhabitants. It's remarkable that Mir is still a going concern when you consider how old it is. Of course, if they do bring the astronauts back and leave it unmanned, it will soon begin to tumble and no one will be able to dock ever again, and it will become permanent space junk, or burn up like Skylab. I don't know which alternative is reasonable but it bothers me that we're littering Antartica and our own atmosphere just as fast as we littered the inhabited portions of the earth.